Marielle Franco’s murder remains unsolved one month later

April 17, 2018 | Brainwave Science

SITUATION

Thousands gathered in Brazilian cities on Saturday to mark one month since the murder of Rio de Janeiro city councilwoman Marielle Franco, whose murder shocked the country and the international community, and until now, remains unsolved.

Franco was shot four times in the head at close range in central Rio de Janeiro when a car drove alongside her vehicle and a gunman opened fire, killing her and her driver, Anderson Gomes. Franco, a black bisexual, feminist and human rights activist, was an outspoken critic of the endemic police violence in Rio’s poor communities and of the recent security intervention by Brazil’s armed forces.

Days before her killing, Franco publicly denounced Rio’s most violent police unit, known as “the battalion of death”, based in the city’s poor northern suburbs.

Local media reported that prosecutors said the case is advancing well. Fingerprints were found on bullet shell casings that could help identify suspects.

Public Security Minister Raul Jungmann confirmed that the bullets used were police issue, but he claimed they had been stolen from the force “years ago” in an area more than 2,000 kilometers (1,200 miles) away.

Marielle and her driver were shot dead while driving through Rio’s Estacio neighborhood after participating in a public debate on 14 March. At least 13 shots were fired, four of them hitting Marielle in the head. The nature of the shooting and the reported involvement of assailants in two vehicles indicate that it was a carefully planned assassination carried out by trained personnel.

Brazil has more than 60,000 homicides annually – of which, only eight to 10 percent are resolved because of poor quality investigations and over-reliance on witnesses who can be easily intimidated, according to Bruno Paes Manso, a post-doctoral researcher at the Nucleus of Violence Studies at the University of Sao Paulo. Rights groups also say if Marielle Franco’s murder goes unsolved, it will set a dangerous precedent.

Many believe that her killing was ordered by a “militia” or mafia groups, originally made up of off-duty and ex-police officers, who began to take over Rio favelas in the early 2000s under the pretext of defending against drug gangs and since then have grown increasingly powerful.

Failure to identify all those responsible would put dozens of human rights defenders at grave risk. Brazil is one of the world’s deadliest countries for human rights defenders, with at least 58 killings in 2017. Such killings typically discourage mobilization, fuelling fear and silence in society.

“The killing of a black, lesbian, human rights defender who stood up for the most marginalized sectors of society is clearly intended to silence her voice and generate fear and insecurity. But we will continue to raise our voices” stated Jurema Werneck, Executive Director at Amnesty International Brazil.

CHALLENGE

With the current context in Brazil, authorities are facing an incredible challenge to solve the murder of Marielle Franco. This is not only to make her justice, but it is also important for a message transmitted to the world.

For the black and gay community, for Amnesty International Brazil, for human rights in general, the murder of the politician is a grave offense that needs justice. In addition to the general law enforcement challenges, regarding the limitations of their current investigation technologies and methods, Brazil has more than 60,000 homicides annually – of which, only eight to 10 percent are resolved because of poor quality investigations.

With the mafia groups and threats in the area, new challenge ads up to law enforcement’s mission to shed light in this case.

So how can investigative agents overcome all these challenges and solve the murder case to not only make the politician’s justice but also send an international message that such crimes will not be tolerated?

WHY ICOGNATIVE ?

Did you ever imagine that an innovative technology could go where no other investigative method has gone before? iCognative by Brainwave Science sets a new standard in security solutions that can aid nations across the globe.

This state of the art investigative solution can provide personnel from Law Enforcement, Border Security, Counterintelligence and Counterterrorism industries to make their investigative process more effective. The system behindiCognativerelies only on the human brain, as the brain stores facts and events long after they happened. In addition, it doesn’t need human intervention, so it’s not prone to errors.

In the case of the murder of Marielle Franco, the solution can prove to be invaluable in solving the case. With it, any person relevant to the case can become a subject of the test.

The main advantage of this new technological solution stands in its ability to distinguish between an innocent and a suspect, by detecting information present in the brain. To build the test, any confidential information only known to perpetrator will be used as input to the system to conduct a test on suspects. In this specific crime, according to the media, there are a series of information that can be input into the system as stimuli: the bullet shell casings, the date, and location of the murder – 14 March, Rio Estacio neighborhood, the 2 vehicles of the assailants. This information can be used as stimuli either in the form of pictures or text depending on in what form it is available.

During the iCognative test, the stimuli selected for each subject will be displayed on a computer screen, so that system can capture that “aha” moment if the information is present. At the end of the test, the system analyses the brain’s responses to the respective stimuli through a series of algorithms determines with 99.9% accuracy if the information is absent or present in the brain of the tested subject. The iCognative testing can help investigative agents successfully solve the case and save resources and time.

With the help of this innovative technology, Brazil’s law enforcement has a real chance of solving this murder and brings justice to the former politician. In addition, the solving of this case will send a powerful human rights message.